Issue link: https://beckershealthcare.uberflip.com/i/1233999
10 CFO / FINANCE CMS cuts payments to 786 hospitals over high rates of infection, injury By Ayla Ellison C MS will trim 786 hospitals' Medicare pay- ments in fiscal year 2020 for having the high- est rates of patient injuries and infections. Five things to know: 1. Created under the ACA, the Hospital-Acquired Conditions Reduction Program aims to prevent harm to patients by providing a financial incentive for hospitals to prevent hospital-acquired conditions. Under the program, a hospital's total score is based on performance on six quality measures. Each year, Medicare cuts payments by 1 percent for hospitals that fall in the worst-performing quartile. 2. On Jan. 29, CMS identified the 786 hospitals that will have their Medicare payments reduced for pa- tients discharged between last October and this September, according to Kaiser Health News. e penalties will be applied as hospitals submit claims to Medicare for reimbursement. 3. According to KHN, Medicare is penalizing the following seven hospitals named to U.S. News' Best Hospitals Honor Roll: • UPMC Shadyside (Pittsburgh) • Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center (Los Angeles) • Keck Hospital of USC (Los Angeles) • Stanford (Calif.) Hospital • UCSF Medical Center (San Francisco) • NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital (New York City) • Mayo Clinic (Phoenix) 4. e Hospital-Acquired Conditions Reduction Program is in its sixth year. Sixteen hospitals across the U.S. have been penalized all six years since the program's implementation, according to KHN. 5. e hospital industry has argued the program's design causes hospitals that do the best job of test- ing for infections to appear among the worst based on statistics, while those with less thorough testing might appear better than they should. n IRS revokes hospital's tax-exempt status By Ayla Ellison T he Internal Revenue Service determined in January a hospital no longer qualified for a tax exemption after selling its assets, according to Law360. The IRS posted a letter to its website Jan. 23, explaining why it re- voked the hospital's tax-exempt status. The letter redacted the hospi- tal's name and other identifying information. According to the letter, the hospital, which had been tax-exempt since the 90s, sold its assets in recent years. The IRS revoked the tax-exempt status of the hospital because it failed to establish it operated exclusively for an exempt purpose after the asset sale, according to the letter. After the sale, all medical services were provided by the successor organization, and the hospital "did not operate as a corporate entity and ceased to have an exempt purpose," stated the letter. The IRS said the hospital did not correctly terminate its tax-exempt status after the sale, and its board failed to file articles of dissolution with the state. n Pennsylvania hospital loses license By Ayla Ellison E llwood City (Pa.) Medical Center's provisional license with the Pennsylvania Department of Health has expired, and it can no longer operate, according to the Ellwood City Ledger. The hospital was operating under a provisional license after be- ing cited more than 40 times by the Pennsylvania Department of Health during the two years since it was acquired by Fort Lauder- dale, Fla.-based Americore Health. On Nov. 27, state health officials ordered the hospital to suspend inpatient and emergency services due to serious violations, including failure to pay employees and the inability to offer surgical services. Americore, which filed for Chap- ter 11 bankruptcy in December, shut down Ellwood City Medical Center Dec. 10. The hospital submitted a plan Dec. 18 to state health officials to cor- rect the deficiencies. The health department conducted an onsite inspection Jan. 3 and determined the hospital "had not shown its suitability to resume providing any healthcare services." The health department said the ban on services would remain in effect until the hospital properly implemented a corrective action plan. Ellwood City Medical Center's provisional license expired Jan. 28 and has not been renewed. The hospital does not meet the mini- mum requirements for a provisional license and is not permitted to offer any services, a spokesperson for the health department told the Ellwood City Ledger. n